1st Abdul Kalam Conference: INDIA 2020 UPDATE
“Sustainable Human Development”
IITM, Chennai, India
July 11-14, 2019
“How can India reach the top HDI while keeping the ecological footprint sustainable?”
INDIA 2020
"INDIA
2020: A VISION FOR THE NEW MILLENNIUM" was authored
by Dr. Abdul Kalam and Dr. V.S. Rajan. It was
developed from one of the first major products of
the TIFAC: The Technology
Information Forecasting and Assessment Council,
formed in 1988 to "
look ahead at the technologies emerging worldwide
and pick those technology trajectories which were
relevant for India and should be promoted. In its
Task TIFAC networked various stakeholders: the
government industries , users scientific and
technological institutions , financial institutions
and intellectuals." At their meeting in 1993, a
member asked the question: "Mr Chairman, we all have to
address one issue: India today almost fifty years
since 1947, is branded a developing country. What
will make a country a developed nation?" That led to
a report that was since edited into a book that was
suitable for public readership.
It should
be noted that in 1991, India was facing crisis in
foreign exchange reserves. The dream of " a
developed nation" certainly seemed remote.
The book
has inspired hundreds of millions of Indians. It
laid out 6 "core areas" where focused development
would lead to the desired objective.
Well.... 2020 is less than a year and half away.
Where has India reached?
The answer
is at once stunningly inspiring, and somewhat
daunting. Stunning advances have been made, so that
today India's GDP is ranked 5th in the world, and
projected to rise to #3 rather soon.
So our
first message is that of congratulating the people
of India on this immense achievement. It should
inspire people to move ahead.
But GDP is
the total output of over 1.3 billion people. It is a
well-recognized measure, but does not have the
granularity to reveal the situation of individual
residents. There are immense challenges still to be
faced. These are seen when one considers the
Human Development Index: India's HDI is on par with
most other developing nations, at 0.6 on a
logarithmic scale. A far cry from that of the
"advanced" nations that are around 0.9 to 0.95.
Isn't that
a simple problem, then, of imitating industrial
development to get to the level of these "developed"
nations?
No.
The
"developed" nations consume resources at a rate that
is several times the level that is sustainable. The
Ecological Footprint (EF) of a nation measures the
consumption of resources, per person, measured as
the land area in hectares needed to sustain the
average lifestyle of the nation. In other words, the
cost of achieving that HDI. India's EF is
around 0.8. The "advanced nations" with HDI around
0.9, have an EF of around 10.
The Global
Sustainable level of EF is around 2.5 hectares per
person. Clearly, if India were to advance in HDI to
0.9, the price to be paid in EF would be
unacceptable.
So there
has to be a better way, and the purpose of this
Conference is to brainstorm towards that better way.
A high HDI, for a billion-plus people, at a low EF.
Given the
record to-date, India will achieve this. Failure is
not an option.
TIFAC still does excellent work, collecting and
analyzing data and producing reports and
projections. Some examples are given below:
TIFAC's
2020 Retrospective: Courtesy Dr. Prabhat Ranjan,
TIFAC
